Whatever you do, please don’t over-animate your characters. Some writers have a bad habit of making their characters move and use body language every time they speak or sometimes every time they are mentioned in a scene. If your character is distressed, they might do one or two of the movements listed below, but they don’t tend to go through the whole list in a few pages.

This sheet could be much longer. For instance, I’d add “looking down and to the left” under lying and “gripping something so hard knuckles turn white” to anger, but this list can help you think of another body language you’ve seen people display under certain situations. As always, this is only a tool to make you think, not a comprehensive list…

This wheel of emotions comes in handy more often than I’d like to admit. This is one of the writing graphics I snagged off the net that sometimes inspires, sometimes leads my character in a new direction or does exactly what it was meant to do and helps me find a more specific word for an emotion.

When I’m stuck, this is one of the graphics I take a look at to see if it sparks something I hadn’t thought of for my character. For instance, I had a character that was frustrated and I was stuck on what she would do next. After looking at the wheel, I realized that she could easily become hostile, which made the scene much more exciting. Well, exciting to write at least.

NaNoWriMo & NaBloPoMo

Quotes

“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot…reading is the creative center of a writer’s life… you cannot hope to sweep someone else away by the force of your writing until it has been done to you.” – Stephen King